


everything has changed, and now it's only you that matters

by overcomewithlongingfora_girl



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Assassination Attempt(s), But Not Everyone Knows It's Uhhhh Fake, Fluff, Found Family, Getting Together, Hurt Zuko (Avatar), M/M, Toph Beifong and Zuko are Siblings, Zuko Fakes His Own Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-25
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:08:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24908920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/overcomewithlongingfora_girl/pseuds/overcomewithlongingfora_girl
Summary: When Zuko is the victim of one too many assassination plots, he fakes his death to flush out traitors. Just, not everyone gets the news that it was fake.
Relationships: Sokka/Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong & Zuko
Comments: 178
Kudos: 2916





	everything has changed, and now it's only you that matters

The attempts start virtually as soon as Ozai falls on the battlefield. The warships turn back toward the Fire Nation, the armies withdraw from the Earth Kingdom, and out of every hundred soldiers, there are eighty who want to kill the new Fire Lord.

Or, that’s what it feels like. The group dissolves and disbands after a few blissful days, and Zuko can’t say he blames them. Sokka and Katara go back to a tribe newly reformed, and of course, Aang goes with them. Toph wants to give her parents one last chance, and if that doesn’t work out, there’s a whole Earth Kingdom to travel. Suki offers her services, and those of the Kyoshi warriors, but Zuko tells them all to go home, take some time. They’re still only teenagers, after all.

More surprising are Ty Lee and Mai. With Azula imprisoned just outside the palace, in a hospital where all the staff are doctors and try to reach her through words, Zuko had thought that her closest friends would feel safe enough to visit her. But when he brings it up, over dinner, the two both look away.

“She’s hurt us a lot, Zuko.” Mai’s voice is low. It’s almost an unconscious gesture when she reaches for Ty Lee’s hand, and in that gesture, the movement toward each other, Zuko sees something, and thinks he understands. Azula hadn’t allowed the people around her to love each other. Love was an emotion she didn’t understand; something that she couldn’t control. She had pushed Zuko toward Mai, knowing that he would never love her friend, knowing that they would never be a threat. Zuko had never imagined what it had felt like for Mai, on the other side. He thinks he sees a flash of it, in the fleeting, sideways smile Mai shoots Ty Lee. It was just right for Azula – her brother and her best friend, making each other miserable – and Ty Lee, too, an unexpected boon.

But there are different kinds of love. There’s the love that made Mai save Zuko, all those weeks ago, at Boiling Rock. There’s the love that Ty Lee returns across the table at Mai, beaming at her so bright that Mai has to look away to hide the raw joy on her face.

That little gesture, that turning away from what makes her happy – Zuko always thought Mai learned that from her parents. Now it seems more like Azula’s work.

“I don’t think we’re ready to see Azula yet,” Ty Lee says, with her characteristic smile, but none of her brightness. The smile slips. “We love her, though. Will you tell her?”

Zuko tells them that he will. The next morning, he’s bidding them farewell from the palace steps. When they disappear from sight, he walks back over the threshold alone. It’s only been a few days. His chest still aches with the memory of lightning, and already, he’s alone again.

Uncle is there, of course, sitting across from him at every meal, his warm voice filling up the war rooms where generals cast the green young Fire Lord nasty looks with no fear of repercussions. It’s impossible work, running a nation and learning how to run a nation, all at the same time. Zuko knows his nation, his very palace, is full of spies and doubters and loyalists. What he doesn’t know is any way to weed them out besides to wait.

Waiting yields results – dangerous ones. There’s poisoned food, and hidden traps, and soldiers that try to lead him down dark hallways. He begins to feel like Azula, seeing death in every doorway, except that five times out of ten, Zuko is right. Uncle suggests he double his guard, but how does that solve anything when his guard might be the very people trying to kill him? Zuko prefers only two armed escorts. Few enough that he can take them down, if he needs to, and enough that they make good allies in a fight.

More than once, it is the former case, and not the latter. Zuko gives them all decent soldier’s burials, even the ones that died trying to force a knife in his back. He doesn’t know what else to do. He feels this way all the time now. He just doesn’t know what else to do.

The weeks drag on and the attempts taper off. Zuko recognizes the faces of the servants and the guards and feels far more relaxed when he can greet them by name and ask after their families. He begins to trust that they won’t kill him, these everyday companions.

He’s right. It’s no longer the servants and the guards he has to worry about.

The final attempt happens at night, when Uncle Iroh has long since gone to bed, and Zuko is alone in his chamber. He is writing a letter to Toph. She’ll have to find someone to read it to her. Perhaps it’s because he’s thinking about the little earthbender, and how attuned she is to the world around her. Maybe that’s the reason that Zuko suddenly notices an extra source of heat in the room behind him.

It’s a harder battle than most of them, and Zuko keeps wondering why his guards aren’t coming. Maybe they’ve been killed. Maybe they’re waiting to see the killer walk through the door, victorious with Zuko’s head. If that is so, they’ll be disappointed this night. The battle ends with Zuko drawing his double blades out of the masked man’s chest. The very thought of killing used to make him sweat with guilt. Now, he knows that if murder is an unforgivable sin, then he’s too tainted for any kind of penance to ever wipe him clean.

When Zuko unmasks his dead attacker, it’s no commoner, no servant, no loyal member of the guard. It’s a general, someone whose discontented face Zuko has seen too many times in the war room. No wonder he’d been so hard to kill.

For a few minutes, Zuko sits with the body. He wonders how many other men in that war room are waiting for their turn to don a mask and sneak into his chambers. He wonders when it will end, if it will end, how he will know when it’s over. He comes to a decision.

Before he leaves, he burns the body.

_

By the next day, it’s all over town. The Fire Lord’s been murdered, burned to death in his bedroom. The prince’s uncle, the Dragon of the West, verified the ashy corpse himself. The short-lived boy king is truly gone.

Some people weep. These are the widowers, the destitute mothers whose empty tables have taught them the bitter cost of war. There are generals who bend their heads, thinking of long days of fire and dust and sweat and blood, and how a fresh-faced teenager promised to end it. There are palace servants who remember a quiet, polite boy, who thanked them for their work and tried to learn their names.

But there are others. There are generals who smile in the war room, ponder aloud, with false concern, the question of succession. Ozai’s been overthrown by the avatar himself, and the airbender won’t stand for a reinstatement. Who should the crown go to, then? And what will the victor do with a kingdom full of fighters, full of soldiers, full of born and raised conquerors?

More than one general sits back in their chair, steepling their fingers and considering the ranks of soldiers more loyal to them than to some vacant crown.

And in the corner of the room, Uncle Iroh watches. He is not the Dragon of the West, poses no noteworthy threat to whatever power grabs these officials dream of. He is a lonely, bereft, grieving old man, who is always bent over, laboring, trying to scratch out a worthy eulogy to the young man that was a son to him.

They pay him no mind, and so they never notice his list of names.

The deception lasts a week. After a week, the names on the list are called one by one into the throne room by the Dragon of the West. Only after each one is in a cell not far from his father does Zuko step back out of the shadows.

But not everyone hears this second part of the story.

_

The Earth Kingdom was colonized by the Fire Nation, but not destroyed. The invading army saw no sense in destroying crops, industrious little towns, or mail and news systems. Toph hears about Zuko’s death a handful of days after it supposedly occurs. By the time his deceit is common knowledge, she is traveling too fast for word to reach her.

When she arrives in the throne room, she assumes she’ll be greeted by a broken Uncle Iroh. Way up on the dais, dressed in a king’s robes, it takes her long, doubtful, hope-against-hope moments to ensure that it is Zuko, that he is real and whole and gloriously _alive._ Once she knows for sure it’s him, she grabs on and won’t let go.

“I’m okay, Toph. I promise I’m okay.”

“Never-never-never, _never,_ okay, _never-”_

“Never what, Toph? Never what?”

“I don’t know.” She’s crying into his robes, and Zuko wishes it were possible to hold her closer. “I don’t know, just, just never.”

Zuko never does find out just what she means, but from then on, Toph sleeps on the bed in his chambers.

_

He didn’t realize how alone he was until Toph returned. His uncle is as kind as always, as welcoming, as warm, but Zuko misses the excitement and adventure, the simple ease of having young people around him. He doesn’t have much to worry about, anymore, because Toph Beifong is always around him. She eats at his side and they wander the grounds and she snores loudly in his war room while his generals try to speak. She even comes with him to visit Azula and his father, although she has to wait on the other side of a door. If she hears the things they say to him she gets too angry. It’s not safe.

Just once, Zuko tries to ask her about her parents. “How…how did it go?” He’s leaning up against a cherry tree in one of the courtyards, leafing through a field report. Toph is draped across his feet, using one hand flat against the earth to track the movements of worms through the dirt. A few minutes ago, she’d explained that she couldn’t feel the worms themselves, but she could feel the earth moving where they’d been.

She’s kind of incredible, Zuko thinks, as he lays down the field report and looks at her, the dark-haired, green-eyed, fierce, funny girl lying over his feet. She’s special. She’s really special. How could her parents let her go?

So he asks. “How did it go, when you went back to see your parents?”

Usually, Toph does the courtesy of looking at the people who are talking to her. Now, she just stares blankly straight ahead, fingers still probing the grass in front of her. Minutes pass, and Zuko thinks she isn’t going to answer.

“They don’t want me back.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Oh?”

“There’s no way they couldn’t want you.” Toph tips her head, still not turning her head to Zuko, and he’s glad that she can’t see his blush.

“They wanted a daughter, just not _me.”_ Toph rolls off Zuko’s feet, but before he can feel the loss, she’s army-crawling up next to him to put her head on his stomach. He almost stops breathing when her warm weight settles on him. “You’re my family now, you know?”

“Y-yeah?”

“Yeah.” Now she tips her head up and grins at him. It puts a crack in Zuko’s heart – the good kind, a thing he can’t explain but feels in his gut. “Aren’t I?”

He nods vigorously, because just for right now, he can’t quite speak. He knows that nodding isn’t enough for Toph, so he clears his throat with difficulty. His voice still comes out raspy. “Yeah. Yeah. You are.”

“Good.”

“Yeah.” His arm comes down around her waist, and he squeezes her, making her laugh. He can’t resist it. He feels so unbearably soft. “Really, really good.”

-

Down in the South Pole, where news from the outside is intermittent and unreliable, Sokka doesn’t hear the news for months. When he overhears two soldiers cracking jokes about the dead fire king, Sokka loses his legs, slides down against the side of the village wall until he’s crouching in the snow.

“What…what did you say?”

One of the men glances over at him. They’re transfers from the Northern Water Tribe, an attempt at unity, and they don’t understand why Sokka is crumpled on the ground looking gutted. One of them shrugs, cracks a grin. “That Fire Lord, the new one, with the burn on his face?”

“Y-yeah?”

“Someone came back and finished the job. I heard when they found his body, they couldn’t even tell it was a person. Identified him by his crown and his teeth.”

It takes five men to pin Sokka down, and even then, they can’t shut his mouth. Even when they have his limbs pressed down in the snow, even when it’s his father, sprinting through the village to speak reason to his son, Sokka doesn’t stop screaming.

“ _He’s sixteen, you fucking assholes! He’s sixteen! He helped us, he’s my friend, he’s fucking sixteen!”_

Hakoda throws himself down on top of Sokka, lets his entire weight press his son into the snow. Only then, when he sees his father’s face, does Sokka break. “Dad!” He wails it, the tears coming fast and hard and thick. “Dad! _Dad!”_

His father can’t say that it’s okay, so he chooses not to say anything at all. Sokka takes the next ship to the capital.

“Wait for Katara.” Hakoda is still urging patience, even the day that Sokka is leaving. Katara and Aang have been gone for a little over three days, some pointless, fun little adventure of theirs. Sokka doesn’t want to wait for them. He especially doesn’t want to be there to see their faces when they hear.

Hakoda feels differently. “Wait for your sister. Wait for Aang. I don’t want you to go alone.”

“I’m going now. I’ll see you in a few weeks.”

“Sokka.” Hakoda’s mouth works as he considers the words. Each one of them carries specific, meaningful weight when he does decide to say them. “Getting to the Fire Nation faster will not bring him back.”

It’s the wrong thing to say. Sokka’s face goes distant and cold, and he hitches his pack up on his shoulder. “Bye, Dad.”

“Goodbye, Sokka.”

_

The icy calm lasts until the ship makes port in the capital city. For the first time since his father saw him off, Sokka feels himself in his body. For the past few days, he’s felt tethered to himself by the thinnest of cords, a mere passenger watching himself go through the most basic motions required of him. Not anymore. Suddenly, he’s seeing through his eyes, feeling air and clothes and sun on his skin. It is not a pleasant reunion. He barely makes it to the edge of the dock before he’s heaving up the meager meal of bread and broth he’d eaten just a few hours before. Suddenly he’s no longer numb, he’s sick and sore and hurting. He stumbles through the city to the castle.

Sokka feels half-deranged as he pushes past guards. They try to talk to him but he can’t hear a thing except waves in his ears. They keep trying to talk to him, reach out for him, but he can’t breathe, he can’t hear, he’s drawing his sword to keep them back.

It works. No one comes near him. With gestures, they lead him through the palace, down hallways and through doors. Sokka doesn’t realize where they’re going until they leave him there, in Zuko’s chambers.

In a daze, he wanders through the room, wondering where it happened. There are no burn marks anywhere. They must’ve already cleaned it up. Breathless, Sokka stares around the room, eyes huge and haunted. He doesn’t know why he’s here. Maybe he’s waiting for Iroh, but _god,_ why is he waiting here? He’s an absolute wreck when Zuko and Toph come running in.

It takes _forever_ for Sokka to be able to understand what they’re saying. Mostly he spends that time clinging to Zuko, crying hard and completely unselfconsciously. Toph sits on the other side of him and rubs his back. Zuko mostly sits there, not knowing what to say or do, but every so often he reaches up and tentatively strokes Sokka’s hair, which sends the Water Tribe warrior entirely to pieces.

“I thought you were _gone.”_ It’s the first thing that Sokka’s said that makes sense. “Zuko. Zuko. Zuko, I thought you were gone.”

“I’m right here. I’m still right here.”

“We never should’ve left. I’m so sorry, Zuko. I never should’ve left; I never should’ve left.”

“That’s okay,” Toph pipes up from behind him. “We came back.”

“And I’m _staying.”_

Zuko clears his throat. “You…you don’t have to do that.”

“Yes I _fucking do._ ” When Sokka pulls back, he glares so fiercely that Zuko might’ve been scared, if he couldn’t feel Sokka’s hands shaking. “I…Zuko, I thought you were…dead.” He swallows hard. Behind him, Toph does, too. “I thought…I mean, we, I left you here alone. You needed us…me, and we weren’t there.”

“It’s okay,” Zuko says softly. “You can’t always be here.”

Sokka growls. “Try me.”

_

It’s the third night of Sokka being there that Zuko has nightmares. Toph is sleeping on the couch, and Sokka’s sleeping on the floor, and both of them are woken by the Fire Lord crying. His eyes are still shut tight, but he’s sobbing hard, heaving in these huge, wrenching breaths that make his entire body shake.

Together, the two stand by Zuko’s bedside, watching the young Fire Lord twitch and tremble. His whole face twists in anguish, and Sokka leans forward, too scared to touch him but completely unable to leave him on his own. “What’s going on? Toph? What’s happening?”

“He has nightmares,” Toph shrugs. She reaches out, tucks a lock of hair behind Zuko’s ear. There’s a complicated expression on her face – love and worry and resignation.

“What-what do we do?”

Heaving a sigh, Toph thinks about it for a long moment and then just shrugs again. “Nights like these, he’ll keep having them, even if I wake him up.”

On the bed, Zuko whimpers, a sound like a child crying, and Sokka feels like his heart is being pulled right out of his chest. “What do we _do?”_

In answer, Toph reaches out and takes Zuko’s hand. A small amount of the tension clears from Zuko’s face, but there are still tears running down his cheeks. “It’s not enough.” Sokka swallows hard, shakes his head. “It’s not enough.”

“What do you want to do?” Toph snaps. “You hold him.”

She doesn’t say _hold his hand._ She says _hold him._

Sokka does. Sokka climbs in bed with Zuko and pulls him close, and with Sokka’s arms around him, Zuko finally goes quiet. Once he’s there, next to him, Sokka can’t resist. There’s this howling need in his heart to pull Zuko in, all the way to his chest, and then wrap his arms around Zuko’s shoulders, and hold him close. Sokka feels dazed, heady, this feeling like falling and flying.

He doesn’t hear Toph. “ _Finally,”_ she mutters, as she makes her way back to the couch.

_

It takes a few weeks, but Toph moves into the bedroom down the hall, and Sokka moves into Zuko’s chambers. While she’s moving her things, Zuko comes to stand in the doorway, and though she can’t see the expression on his face, Toph can tell from his heartbeat that he’s frightened. “Don’t…” He swallows hard. “Don’t leave.”

“I’m not staying in that bedroom while the two of you-”

“No!” Zuko goes bright red, which again, Toph can’t see, but she can tell from his shriek that he’s embarrassed. “No, I just mean…” his voice is small enough that Toph stops joking and looks at him, serious and waiting. “I just mean don’t… _leave_.”

She reaches out, puts her small, cold hand in his. “I’m not leaving you, Zuko. Ever. Promise.”

He squeezes her hand. She’s said it before, but now she thinks he’s starting to believe her.

_

That night, when Zuko and Sokka fall into bed after the kind of activities that they’re glad Toph isn’t around to hear, Zuko asks the same thing of Sokka, even though he’s right there, sweaty and grinning in Zuko’s bed.

“Sokka? Please don’t…please don’t leave.”

“I’m not going anywhere, babe, I’m exhausted.”

The casual ease of the pet name has Zuko’s throat aching. “No, I just mean, don’t…leave.”

Sokka goes quiet, still. “You mean like before.”

“…Yeah.”

Reaching out, Sokka pulls Zuko in hard, so his shoulder crashes right into Sokka’s chest. Maybe there will be a bruise tomorrow, but Sokka still just holds Zuko hard and doesn’t let go. He may not be Toph, but he can feel Zuko’s jackrabbit heartbeat.

“Zuko. Zuko, when I thought you were gone…” Sokka clears his throat noisily, painfully. “When I thought you were gone…”

“We don’t have to talk about it.”

“I know, just…” Sokka searches for the words. “I had this feeling, then, like I would do anything – anything! If I could just…” he’s choking on the words. “If it would mean that…”

“It’s okay, Sokka. We don’t have to talk about it.”

Sokka goes quiet for a long moment, his arms still tight around Zuko’s chest. “You don’t waste a chance like that,” he finally says quietly. “I’m not going to waste my chance.”

“Okay,” Zuko says, but it’s more of a whisper as he leans into Sokka’s chest. “Okay.”

Long after Zuko’s fallen asleep, Sokka is lying awake thinking about it. He’s here. He’s here, he’s Sokka’s, he’s alive.

Sokka will never take that for granted again.

**Author's Note:**

> More Toph-centric than usual, but hopefully there's enough Zukka for everyone too!
> 
> If you want to chat, or have any new fic ideas/requests, I'm on tumblr at overcomewithlongingfora-girl, and I would LOVE to hear from you :)


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